Stupid Is As Stupid Does
I'm reading this book called Proust Was a Neuroscientist, about ways that artists foresaw things about the way people's minds and bodies work that took science decades or centuries to discover. I really enjoyed the chapter on Middlemarch, which dealt with the issue of how much of human existence is preordained by genes and how much is open to adaptation and chance. Nature vs. nurture is endlessly debated in all sorts of disciplines; the author here seems to be saying that one of the things that is most deeply programmed in us by our genetic code is the ability to to change. Among the scientific discoveries he uses to illustrate this is neurogenesis, the creation of new brain cells, thought to be impossible until the 1990s. The whole section (indeed the whole book) is very interesting, but this is the part that made the biggest impression on me:
Gould has gone on to show that the amount of neurogenesis is itself modulated by the environment, and not just by our genes. High levels of stress can decrease the number of new cells; so can being low in a dominance hierarchy (the primate equivalent of being low class). In fact, monkey mothers who live in stressful conditions give birth to babies with drastically reduced neurogenesis , even if those babies never experienced stress themselves. But there is hope: the scars of stress can be healed. When primates were transferred to enriched enclosures - complete with branches, hidden food, and a rotation of toys - their adult brains began to recover rapidly. In less than four weeks, their deprived cells underwent radical renovations and formed a wealth of new connections. Their rates of neurogenesis returned to normal levels. What does this data mean? The mind is never beyond redemption, for no environment can extinguish neurogenesis. As long as we are alive, important parts of the brain are dividing. The brain is not marble, it it clay, and our clay never hardens.
So my current situation of high stress and being low on a dominance hierarchy is actually making me stupider, as I suspected, but it seems the damage won't be permanent. I just have to figure out how to get myself an enriched enclosure. A job would help - at the very least it would help buy me some new toys. I'm thinking a Wii.
Gould has gone on to show that the amount of neurogenesis is itself modulated by the environment, and not just by our genes. High levels of stress can decrease the number of new cells; so can being low in a dominance hierarchy (the primate equivalent of being low class). In fact, monkey mothers who live in stressful conditions give birth to babies with drastically reduced neurogenesis , even if those babies never experienced stress themselves. But there is hope: the scars of stress can be healed. When primates were transferred to enriched enclosures - complete with branches, hidden food, and a rotation of toys - their adult brains began to recover rapidly. In less than four weeks, their deprived cells underwent radical renovations and formed a wealth of new connections. Their rates of neurogenesis returned to normal levels. What does this data mean? The mind is never beyond redemption, for no environment can extinguish neurogenesis. As long as we are alive, important parts of the brain are dividing. The brain is not marble, it it clay, and our clay never hardens.
So my current situation of high stress and being low on a dominance hierarchy is actually making me stupider, as I suspected, but it seems the damage won't be permanent. I just have to figure out how to get myself an enriched enclosure. A job would help - at the very least it would help buy me some new toys. I'm thinking a Wii.